Thursday, July 31, 2014

Buying new locks and door hardware for your home can also support Habitat for
Humanity’s international work.
Yale Locks & Hardware is donating 10 percent of sales from online orders
to Habitat, which builds and renovates homes for qualifying families based on
their income and other requirements.
Shoppers get a 10 percent discount on the New Haven, Conn.-based company’s
products when they use the program code (HFH14) through Oct. 21.
The pictures on the program website (www.yale2you.com//Other/HFH.aspx) are a
reminder that the ideal of a safe, secure home is a starkly different vision
depending on which side of the door locks you find yourself standing.
For some, safe and secure means having your family and your belongings
protected by an alarm system, perhaps one controlled from a smartphone or
computer. At the other end of the spectrum are people who can hardly imagine
ever owning a home that would be considered safe and secure, much less one equipped with automated
locks that open and close without keys. Habitat has made ownership possible for
more than 4 million people.
Yale has partnered with Habitat for 13 years and provided more than $14
million worth of interior and exterior door locks so far for Habitat in North
America. This additional effort will reach further.
“This new campaign will help raise additional funding vital to Habitat’s
mission to create safe, affordable housing in partnership with low-income
families around the world,” Colleen Finn, an exec for Habitat for Humanity
International, said in a statement.

Thursday, July 24, 2014

If businesses can have touchless
paper towel dispensers, William “Bryant” Troutman II and his family wondered, then why can’t
we have them in our homes?
“I wanted one for my kitchen,” said Troutman, 45, of south Charlotte. “When they didn’t
have one, we decided to make one.”
The idea behind the under-cabinet-mounted Innovia Automatic Paper Towel Dispenser the Troutmans created is hands-free convenience and
lower risk of cross contamination in home kitchens.
The dispenser has pulled in two awards and appearances on the ShopHQ TV network. It’s also available online for
$99 from Lowe’s, Home Depot, Costco and www.innoviahome.com. Skymall, the shopping magazine
found aboard airliners, chose the dispenser as the best product of the 2014
INPEX invention and new products expo in June. The dispenser also won a gold
medal from INPEX.
Still, Troutman and his partners, dad
William Troutman and wife JohanaTroutman,
have kept their jobs at their printing business, Charlotte-based Graphics
International.
“It’s been a challenge developing awareness of our product,” Troutman said. “It requires a lot of money and a
lot of patience.”
The family is working to recoup its investment of about $300,000 on the first
12,000 dispensers. The next step is to create a portable version that doesn’t
have to be mounted.

Thursday, July 17, 2014

It's time to do something about the stacks of paper collecting dust in your
home office, attic and other rooms.
If you don’t need those old mortgage loan documents, checks, credit cards,
bank statements and tax forms, shred them – today. It’s for your own good.
Commercial shredders will be waiting from 9 a.m. to noon today during a Community Shred Event at the Ikea parking
lot, 8300 Ikea Blvd. Bring up to three banker boxes, along with outdated
prescription medications, says District 4 Charlotte City Council member Greg Phipps, one of the event's hosts.
Identity theft is a problem nationally, and Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police
Department handles roughly 3,000 cases annually.
“There’s always a problem of someone getting ahold of documentation that they
can use to open an account,” said Sgt. Walter Bowling of CMPD. “You’re making it
easy on the criminal to gain your information if you’re not shredding.”
Identity theft can include fraudulent check cashing, check and credit card
counterfeiting, opening accounts in someone else’s name or taking out loans.
The risks for consumers goes beyond what we throw out. Burglars might take
documents and credit cards. Traffickers can use technology to sell your
information online or make transactions.

Learn more while you’re dumping those old papers today. “It’s not just for
shredding,” Bowling said. “We’re hoping to raise awareness.”

Thursday, July 10, 2014

It was the rosebush or the Japanese beetles. One of them would lose, and that
year I sided with my rugosa Magnifica, a fragrant repeat bloomer that produces
plump rose hips once the magenta flowers are pollinated.
Don’t think it was an easy decision to spray the shrub with an insecticide to
get rid of the pests that had devoured more than a few plants in my yard. The
pollinators that made it possible for me to get rose hips from that bush might
have been the next visitors. So the flowers had to go, too.
Unfortunately, my homemade spray of soapy water and cayenne pepper hadn’t
worked. Manually collecting beetles every day didn’t fix things, either. This
year, I’m just watching the bugs munch. I don’t have a solution, but I don’t
want to put the bees at risk. They’re too valuable.
Bees, butterflies, beetles, hummingbirds, bats and flies carry pollen among
plants as they collect nectar. In the process, they pollinate more than 75
percent of our flowering plants and close to 75 percent of our food crops,
according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.
Bee colony losses are an international concern, and household pesticides are
among the dangers to those creatures. Before spraying in your yard, read up on
protecting pollinators at www.fws.gov. Post your suggestions for protecting
plants from pests at the blog address below.

Thursday, July 3, 2014

Technology companies are in a race to get inside your walls and fixtures.
We’re already walking around with apps for mobile banking and shopping,
navigation, video editing and most other things we want to do.
The next step, the way technology companies see it, is to give us apps to
control what happens at home. Switches for lights and door locks are just the
beginning. Here’s what’s brewing:

Wink, formerly a software
subsidiary of Quirky, is planning a home automation platform that will be
available through Home Depot. The goal is a product that brings together
numerous “smart” devices and wireless protocols (Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, etc.).

Nest Labs is partnering with
outside developers. The Google-owned company wants to grow beyond its smart Nest
thermostat. Mobile controls for appliances might be one outcome.

Microsoft has a new startup
accelerator program for companies focused on home-based sensor technology, cloud
services and tools for analytics. The project comes under Microsoft
Ventures.

Apple has announced a platform
called HomeKit. It would allow users to discover and control all kinds of home
automation devices using a smartphone or tablet.

It won’t be long before Siri is telling the toaster how to cook your bread
and whistling for the teapot.

Karen Sullivan

About this blog

Karen Sullivan is a writer and editor for The Charlotte Observer's SmarterLiving section. In print and online, SmarterLiving looks at new products, the latest technology and "green" trends for your home. Join us here on Homelife to learn more about people (and places) who inspire us to make life at home better.